


Hide and Seek

by orphan_account



Category: Kingsman: The Secret Service (2015)
Genre: Gen, Post-Movie(s), Sibling Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-23
Updated: 2015-04-23
Packaged: 2018-03-25 10:53:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 785
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3807676
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Her brother is a mystery wrapped in an enigma wrapped in a silly wanker wrapped in a tailor-made suit.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hide and Seek

  
She's never told anyone this, but her oldest memory is not of her parents but her brother. It's more of a series of feelings and bright, disjointed kaleidoscope images, really: her brother laughing, a sharp burst of acidic sweetness on her tongue; strange and startling but not in a bad way. He probably let her have a taste of a Dip Dab or something like that, and her toddler self didn't really know what to make of it.

 

* * *

 

Her brother is a mystery wrapped in an enigma wrapped in a silly wanker wrapped in a tailor-made suit. Over the years, he has claimed to be, among other things: a Concorde pilot, a stockbroker, a professional golfer, a rocket scientist (“I hope you know they're actually called _astronautical engineers_.” “Is this what they're teaching you for 30,000 bloody quid a year at that fancy school of yours, mockery and disrespect for your elders?”), an astronaut (“Hopelessly predictable.”), a hotel heir (“You're not even _trying_ anymore.”), a groom at the Royal Mews, a trophy husband, an exotic dancer (“ _There's_ a mental image I never needed.”) and the ghost-autobiographer of the Duchess of Cambridge's hairstylist.  
  
She stopped seriously asking when she got old enough to understand that she's probably better off not knowing.

 

* * *

 

Every once in a while, her brother gets into an accident. Or he's mugged, or he starts a bar fight he can't handle (and she knows in the back of her mind that there isn't the bar fight in the _world_ he couldn't handle; she doesn't even know _how_ she knows this, she just _does_.)  
  
These are the only times he lingers for more than a couple of hours, so really, it's all his fault that she ends up developing what has to be the most fucked up Pavlovian response to the sight of her brother bruised and bandaged and hollow-eyed. She worries, of course she does, but how could she not also feel glad when he's around?  
  
“In conclusion, you've scarred me for life,” she tells him one night when he's catching up on all the Hollyoaks he's missed in the aftermath of his latest mysterious car accident.  
  
“I'm sorry?” he offers, not sounding terribly gutted about the whole thing. He's blinking up at her sleepily, curled up on the bed on his right side because—from what she's gathered—it's the only position that allows him to breathe without crying. “Just send me the therapy bills.”  
  
_I don't need therapy, I need you to not die before you hit forty, you absolute arse,_ she doesn't say, because it would be redundant and cruel and childish.  
  
“The baby is Kyle's,” she tells him instead.  
  
His enraged howl is music to her ears.

 

* * *

  
  
Her brother is all smoke and mirrors; an accent slip-sliding between Cockney and posh and something almost American, an indecipherable schedule, an inexhaustible bank account, a thousand questions with not an answer to be found.  
  
He's the only father she's ever known.  
  
He doesn't cry at her graduation, or take pictures, or do anything but stand there in his expensive suit with a placid smile on his face, and she's not sad, no—she's _furious_. She wants to take him by his broad shoulders and put some wrinkles in that bloody jacket, wants to scream _I'm a gymnast and an equestrian and an Oxford graduate, I speak four languages fluently and get by in a dozen others, I swim and fence and I know at least sixteen ways to kill a man twice my size with my bare hands—am I_ ever _going to be good enough for you?_  
  
She's sulking into her champagne flute when he comes over with her gift and—  
  
“A phone. You got me a bloody _phone_.” It's not even _wrapped_ , for crying out loud.  
  
“Chill out, Material Girl. I promise you're gonna like this one.”  
  
She takes the phone dubiously, and his smirk finally softens into the chuffed-as-all-hell smile she's been waiting for all day.  
  
“Listen, darling, there's a phone number and a bank account number on that. Now I'm going to walk out that door, you have exactly forty-eight hours to find me. Just like hide-and-seek when you were a sprog, yeah? Think big and be smart about it.”  
  
He leans down and drops a gentle kiss on her forehead while she just stands there, rooted to the spot. He's already halfway to the door when she finds her voice.  
  
“What happens if I find you?”  
  
“ _When_ you find me,” he corrects kindly, and she has no idea how she could believe, even for a matter of hours, that he didn't think the world of her, “we're going to sit down and have a talk.”


End file.
